Neomylodon
an Patagonia |Reported=1898 |Researchers=• Florentino Ameghino • Hesketh Prichard • Bernard Heuvelmans • Charlie Jacoby • Austin Whittall }} The Patagonian ground sloth (Neomylodon listai or Grypotherium domesticum) was a cryptid ground sloth proposed to exist in the interior of the Patagonian plains by Florentino Ameghino, based on a number of alleged sightings and on the discovery of a piece of skin. Ameghino confused the issue by connecting the animal with stories of the aquatic, otter-like predator iemisch, but later writers noted that other Patagonian monsters such as the succarath, lobo-toro, and ellëngassën do sound like ground sloths. The story caused quite a stir in turn-of-the-century Europe, and a British expedition was sent to Patagonia to search for more evidence. Ameghino, Florentino (1898) An Existing Ground-Sloth in Patagonia Sightings Undated Francisco Moreno received reports of a terrifying but rare hairy beast from the Tehuelche and Gennake Indians. The explorer Ramón Lista reported the Tehuelche belief that the Sierra Carhuerne, Santa Cruz, was home to "evil spirits and monstrous quadrupeds" which once carried off a whole family of Indians, although Bernard Heuvelmans wrote that, as none of the family surivived, their disappearance was simply attributed to the quadrupeds. Santiago Roth was told by a Tehuelche chief named Kankel that a very savage beast used to live near Lake Buenos Aires in Santa Cruz: when it roared, all the other animals fled, and one day it supposedly killed a herd of horses belonging to Kankel's grandfather. Ameghino claimed that he had heard many stories of a: Although bulletproof skin has often been hailed as good evidence of a ground sloth identity for this and other cryptids, Roy P. Mackal noted that immunity to bullets is a common feature of South American folkloric beings. Even more dramatically, Englishman Arthur Button, who settled in Puerto Natales in 1905, heard stories of "Indians working harvesting corn with animals as large as mylodons and almost buried in the corn," stories which Austin Whittall connects to a putative Patagonian tapir instead of Mylodon.Whittall, Austin Patagonian tapir. Part 2. Proof | Patagonian Monsters patagonianmonsters.blogspot.com 2 July 2019 circa late 1880's Ameghino wrote that Ramón Lista, an explorer and governor of Santa Cruz, told himself, his brother Carlos Ameghino, and several other people of a sighting he'd had of a hairy, pangolin-like creature which he saw whilst riding in the interior of Santa Cruz: Hesketh Prichard, who was sent to Patagonia to search for the Mylodon, could not find a record of the encounter in any of the Library of the Royal Geographical Society's collection of books written by Lista, who was dead by the time of the skin's discovery.Hesketh-Prichard, Hesketh (1902) Through the Heart of Patagonia Lista wrote forty-one books and papers in total, and even Jorge Carman's modern collection of his works, Obras: 1887-1897, does not contain all his writings. 1898 Edward Chace, an American who lived in Patagonia in the early 20th Century, claimed that: According to George Eberhart, who lists the encounter as an ellëngassën sighting, the first incident, in which the animal was actually seen, occurred in 1898. Physical evidence Skin A German sheep rancher named Hermann Eberhard discovered the Cueva del Milodon in January 1895. Inside he found a large piece of hide, 1.5m long and about 70 to 80cm wide, which looked fresh but which he knew belonged to no known animal.Hauthal, R. (1899) Reseña de los Hallazgos en las Cavernas de Última Esperanza Eberhardt kept the skin hanging for a year, until he showed it to a visiting scientist, Nils Otto Gustaf Nordenskjöld, who found more pieces of skin and bones in the cave. His specimens were sent back to Sweden, where they were identified as Mylodon.Lönnberg, E. (1899) On some remains of Neomylodon Listai Ameghino, brought home by the swedish expedition to Tierra del Fuego, 1895-1897 Francisco Moreno, curator of the La Plata Natural Sciences Museum, also took a piece of skin, and sent it back to his museum. At this point, Florentino Ameghino wrote a paper on the Mylodon, allegedly based on a skin found by his brother Carlos, in which he expressed belief that the animal, which he named Neomylodon listai, was still alive. His paper caused an uproar across the world, and led to several expeditions being sent out to find a live Mylodon. The Daily Express expedition under Hesketh Prichard, which did not actually reach the Cueva del Milodon, was sent out after the English palaontologist Ray Lankester mentioned during a lecture that the Mylodon may still live.Holland, W. (1913) To the River Plate and back : the narrative of a scientific mission to South America Moreno, however, insisted that the skin was very old, and sent it to be examined by Sir Arthur Woodward in London, who initially backed Ameghino before deciding the skin was thousands of years old. Ameghino now wrote a note connecting the skin with an animal called the iemisch, an aquatic monster which killed horses. Meanwhile, another scientist named Erland Nordenskjöld had visisted the cave and pronounced that the skin belonged to a different type of sloth, Glossotherium. Geologist Rudolf Hauthal also explored the cave, and declared that the sloths - Grypotherium domesticum - had been kept in there by the Indians in a semi-domesticated state. Further testing suggested that the skins found in the cave were around 10,000 years old, and preserved by climatic conditions. Neomylodon and Grypotherium are now considered synonymous with either Mylodon or Glossotherium. Expeditions 1900 Hesketh Prichard was sent to Patagonia to lead an expedition to search for evidence of the Mylodon in 1900. Shortly before leaving England with his second-in-command, J. B. Scrivenor, he was joined by an unnamed traveller who "showed good evidence that he knew of very recent tracks" of the Mylodon. One newspaper, The Sphere, was optimistic about his chances, writing "whether the party will capture him ''sloth in the act of tearing up a tree in the manner of his ancestors or will first sight one being milked by a Tehuelche Indian, only the return of the expedition can say''"."Does the Gigantic Mylodon Still Live in South America?," The Sphere (20 October 1900) Prichard's evidence found no evidence, and he did not believe a large animal could live in Patagonia's dense Valdivian forests, which he did not explore. However, he admitted that "in addition to the regions visited by our Expedition, there are, as I have said, hundreds and hundreds of square miles about, and on both sides of the Andes, still unpenetrated by man. A large portion of this country is forested, and it would be presumptuous to say that in some hidden valley far beyond the present ken of man some prehistoric animal may not still exist. Patagonia is, however, not only vast, but so full of natural difficulties". 2001 In 2001 Charlie Jacoby, the grandson of Hesketh Prichard, led an expedition to Patagonia to search for evidence of a live ground sloth. Similar cryptids Other ground sloth-like cryptids reported from Patagonia include the ellëngassën, the lobo-toro, and the succarath. Although Ameghino thought the iemisch could be a ground sloth, this theory is discounted by cryptozoologists, and served only to confuse the issue of the Patagonian ground sloth. In popular culture Do you think the exists? If so, what do you think the is? Myth, folklore, hoax, or otherwise made-up (inc. folk memory) Mistaken identity Giant ground sloth Water tiger (e.g. iemisch, yaquaru, giant otter, etc.) *A novel featuring the Patagonian ground sloth, In Quest of the Giant Sloth (1902) was written by Gordon Stables very soon after the Prichard expedition and the scientific furore over the Cueva del Milodon skin. The novel also includes a Patagonian plesiosaur. *Charles Amherst Milward took some hide from the Cueva del Milodon and sent it to his cousin, the grandmother of writer Bruce Chatwin. Chatwin's supposed desire to reach the cave in search of either a living animal or a piece of its skin for himself forms the basis of his popular travelogue In Patagonia (1977). In his examination of sightings near the end of the book, Chatwin concludes that the Mylodon is extinct, and that the yaquaru was "probably a caiman". Further cryptozoological reading *Heuvelmans, Bernard (1955) On the Track of Unknown Animals, Routledge, ISBN 978-1138977525 Notes and references Category:Cryptids Category:South America Category:Argentina Category:Chile Category:Theory: Living fossil - Ground sloth Category:Historical - Modern Category:No recent sightings Category:Featured